Chapter 7

Sloane POV

"I'd rather watch her burn her life down with my brother, so my friend can finally be free."

Knox's words hung in the air, cold and absolute. But ten years of deeply ingrained conditioning couldn't be erased by one brutal truth. My body moved before my brain could stop it. I spun away from the window and lunged toward the massive oak doors. I had to stop him. I had to be the one to pull Finn back from the ledge, just like I always did.

I didn't even make it three steps.

Knox's arm, thick and unyielding as a steel beam, banded around my waist. He jerked me backward, pinning my spine flush against his solid chest. The suffocating, intoxicating scent of a violent thunderstorm and spent gunpowder swallowed me whole, completely drowning out the faint smell of polished wood and old money that permeated the Great Hall.

"Let me go!" I thrashed against his grip, my nails digging uselessly into his forearm. "You're a monster! He's your brother, and he's in agony out there!"

Knox didn't budge. His jaw tightened, the rough stubble there grazing my temple as he leaned down. "He doesn't want to be saved, little one," he murmured, his dark baritone vibrating straight through my ribs. "He wants to drown, and you are not his life raft."

Tears of pure, human frustration burned my eyes. I was entirely powerless against him, physically and fundamentally. The fight drained out of me, leaving only a trembling, exhausted shell. His Alpha aura pressed down on the room, a suffocating weight I could feel but to which my wolfless soul owed no allegiance. It didn't work on me, not the way it would on a she-wolf. But his physical strength was absolute. I was trapped.

Sensing my stillness, Knox gripped my shoulders and turned me around to face him. His dark eyes were entirely black, the merciless gaze of an apex predator locking onto its chosen prey.

"You want to play the martyr for a male who doesn't even see you?" Knox challenged, his voice dropping to a lethal whisper. "Fine. Let's make a wager."

I stared up at him, my breath catching in my throat. "What?"

"If Delilah and Hunter's Mating Ceremony successfully takes place, I will walk away. I will never interfere with you again, and you can go back to your pathetic infatuation." He stepped closer, his massive frame forcing me to tilt my head back. "But if the ceremony fails..."

He reached out, a single, calloused knuckle tracing the line of my jaw. A violent shiver, purely physiological, wracked my body. My skin erupted in goosebumps. It was a reaction born of sheer, overwhelming proximity to a predator, a cocktail of fear, adrenaline, and a furious, defiant anger that he could affect me at all. There was nothing supernatural about it. I hated my body for reacting, for trembling under his touch when my mind screamed to run.

"You're mine," he growled, the possessive rumble vibrating in the floorboards. "I will pursue you. I will ruin you for anyone else. And you will forget my brother's name."

I was pinned by the sheer force of his presence, a human caught in an Alpha's sights. In a moment of sheer, panicked exhaustion, wanting nothing more than an escape from the crushing weight of the moment and knowing I was physically incapable of breaking free, I gave a stiff, jerky nod. It was a surrender of convenience, not belief. A gambit to make him release me. I didn't believe for a second his insane wager would ever come to pass.

A cruel, devastatingly handsome smirk curved his lips. "Good. Now I'm going to go make sure I win."

"You can't," I breathed, the realization of his trap crashing over me. "You can't hurt your friend just to-"

The heavy groan of the front doors swinging open cut me off.

The night air swept into the Great Hall, carrying the sour, heartbroken scent of rain-soaked grass. Finn stood in the threshold. He looked entirely hollowed out, his shoulders slumped and his eyes red-rimmed from whatever fresh hell Delilah had just put him through.

He looked up, instinctively seeking me out-his safe, reliable emotional sponge.

Instead, he found me trapped between Knox's arms and Knox's body. We were inches apart, the air between us practically crackling with the heavy, possessive pheromones of an Alpha asserting his claim.

Finn froze. The vulnerability in his eyes instantly shattered, replaced by a cold, jagged disbelief. His gaze darted from Knox's hands, which were still lingering near my waist, up to my flushed, panicked face.

"What..." Finn's voice was a ragged, sandpaper rasp. "What is going on here?"

I shoved Knox away, stumbling backward like a sinner caught in the light.